Oil is the lifeblood of your engine. Routine oil changes are essential to keeping your engine in good working order. In fact, when it comes to vehicle maintenance, changing your oil is probably one of the most important things you can do. Neglecting to change your oil can ruin your car’s engine. This being said, changing the oil is one of those routine vehicle maintenance tasks that sometimes gets neglected. People forget, or they just get busy. Even worse, you might not realize you need to change it until things start to go seriously wrong.

If you notice one of these issues with your care, it may be time to make sure your car’s oil gets changed out as soon as possible.

The Oil Indicator Dash Light Is On

Many cars these days have a dashboard indicator light for everything. It might tell you specifically that it’s time for an oil change. It may also just say something like “maintenance required” or “check engine” or simply have a picture of an engine. If the oil is low, you may also see a picture of an oil lamp with drips coming out the end. Long story short, if ANY of these lights come on in the dash SOMETHING is wrong and you should probably get it checked out right away.

Low Oil

Hopefully checking your oil level is something you do routinely. We know that it’s easy to forget. You can make a routine of checking your oil every time you fill up on gas, or every other Saturday. We don’t care. Just make sure you do it. Why, you might ask? Well, because if you don’t check it regularly, and you haven’t had your oil changed in some time, you could be driving around with oil levels that way too low. And that could cause permanent damage, even death, of your precious little engine. Soon it will go from the little engine that could, to the little engine that couldn’t. 

If you don’t know how to check your oil here’s a little tutorial:

Increased Oil Viscosity

While you’re checking the oil level in your vehicle, you’ll want to pay attention to the characteristics of the oil that you pull out on the dipstick as well. If the oil on the end of the stick is clearish or yellowish in color, you’re all set. Nothing to worry about. A little bit darker in color is fine too.

If you notice that your oil is black, gritty, and basically a consistency closer to sludge rather than canola oil, you’ve got a problem. That means your oil is no longer lubricating your engine, and probably causing more harm than good. Time to get it changed.

Your Window Sticker Says It’s Time

In the event that you’re unsure whether or not the time has come to change your oil, simply stick to the recommendation of the manufacturer, or go by the window sticker you got from the local grease monkey. This is probably the easiest and simplest way to make sure that you are staying on top of it. If you are really an overachiever, get it changed a little before the mileage is up. If you’re like most people, you will probably end up getting it changed when you are 1,000 miles overdue. The choice is yours, just make sure you get it changed.